Crawford avalanche. (Grayling, Mich.) 1879-19??, 1887-02-03
Natural Selection in Literature.

One of the minor regrets which the
observer of contemporary literature
must feel in view of the fact that he
will probably not be alive a hundred
years hence is that he cannot know
what is to become of all the estimable
books which the press is now pouring
out. If he is an author, he knows that
his own books must at least perish in
the second glacial epoch; and he can
not help the foreboding that much be-
sides which is excellent, and much
which is beautiful, will be lost before
that time in the mere excess of beauty
and excellence. The greatest excel
lence and the greatest beauty are still,
perhaps, as rare as in the past, but we
think that the literary average is in
some ways higher than ever it was.
More honest and faithful and skillful
work is done, and more of it. The
penetrating spirit of democracy has
found its expression in the very quality
of literature; the old oligarchic repub-
lie of letters is passing; already we
have glimpses of the Commune. If the
reader has noted the optimistic tone
of these essays he will conceive
that we are not wholly dismayed
at the prospect, and that we find con-
ISOLATION in recognizing what seems
good now, when the difficult business
of forecasting its future perplexes and
saddens. Our chief concern is that we
in all the books that come to us; but if
the public will keep our secret, we will
confess that we believe this will have
very little to do with their destiny.
The fittest, in literature as in every
thing else, will survive, as it has al
ways done; and for all our confident
air in saying this is well and that is i'll,
we understand perfectly that we are
not dealing final doom. We are saying
what our experience of literature and
OF life has persuaded us is the truth;
but these books are also the expression
of literature and of life, and we will
confess again, if again the public will
keep our secret, that sometimes the
crudest exp ession in that sort seems
better than the finest comment upon it.
We have sometimes suspected that
more thinking, more feeling certainly,
goes to the creation of a poor novel
than to the production of brilliant
criticism; and if any novel of our time
fails to live hundred years, will any
censure of it live? Who can endure
to read old reviews? One can hardly
read them if they are in praise
of ones own books. 1t is not, then,
with wholly impersonal pang, dearly
beloved brother immortals, that we sit
here in our study sorrowfully regard
ing your multitude, and misgiving
which of you shall survive. You can
not oil, that is certain; and mole and
more pensively we perceive that it is
not absolutely for us to say which; but
to use what patience we may if the
poets, the historians, the novelists, the
essayists, are not able to keep their
number within bounds. 1t is vain, at
any rate, to preach Malthusianism to
them, and we willingly relinquish to
the reader the problem of the future,
if, as seems very likely, they should
multiply rather than decrease. 1t is
already quite impossible to do more
than touch contemporary literature at
few points, to speak of what seems
characteristic, or what seems promis-
ing; but the author neglected or over
looked need not despair for that req
son, if he will reflect that criticism can
neither make nor unmake authors
that there have not been greater books
since criticism became an art than
there were before; that, in fact, the
greatest books seem to have come
much earlier.--W ID. Howells.